1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to a Visible Light Communication (VLC) system, and more particularly, to an apparatus and method for supporting mobility of a mobile terminal that performs VLC with a VLC device included in the VLC system.
2. Description of the Related Art
As the name implies, VLC refers to wireless communication technology for communication using light in a visible light wavelength band. VLC is an alternative to a radio frequency-based communication scheme, and has being actively studied with the increased usage of Light Emitting Diodes (LEDs).
FIG. 1 illustrates a conventional Visible Light Communication (VLC) system.
Referring to FIG. 1, the conventional VLC system includes a lighting lamp 100 and a mobile terminal 105. The lighting lamp 100 includes at least one LED 115 or Laser Diode (LD) whose color and illumination intensity can be controlled, such that the lighting lamp 100 provides a lighting function and transmits data received from an Access Point (AP) 110 by using visible light. The mobile terminal 105 includes a VLC transceiver (not shown) to perform data transmission and reception with the lighting lamp 100. The AP 110 is connected with the lighting lamp 100 in order to provide a data service to a user via the lighting lamp 100. A frequency band used in the lighting lamp 100 allows high-speed data transmission. A reception side, i.e., the mobile terminal 105, processes the visible light using, for example, a Photo Diode (PD), thereby performing VLC.
In the conventional VLC system, as illustrated in FIG. 1, only physical mobility is considered. More specifically, the mobile terminal 105 performs VLC under the single lighting lamp 100, so that the VLC is achieved only within a region covered by the lighting lamp 100.
As such, conventionally, a lighting function and a communication function are provided by using all of the LEDs included in a lighting lamp, which counters an advantage of using an LED, i.e., low power consumption, because data transmission is performed using the communication function, even with an LED that is located in a region where there is no mobile terminal, thus causing unnecessary power consumption.
Accordingly, in an existing VLC system, the same data is transmitted by all of the light sources without considering the mobility of a mobile terminal, thereby causing unnecessary power consumption.